Saturday

PANAMA CITY — From about 5 miles out at sea, on a clear night, areas of Bay County become visible.

PANAMA CITY — From about 5 miles out at sea, on a clear night, areas of Bay County become visible.

Tyndall Air Force Base, the city and the beach appear as faint glows on the horizon from the seaside vantage point.

Panama City plans to put an 85-foot-high pinpoint in the glowing skyline to let not just the seaworthy, but anyone within eyeshot — especially tourists — know where to find its new marina.

“It’s going to be one of the attractions we have out there; people will come down to see the lighthouse, eat and shop,” said Mayor Greg Brudnicki. “Each one by itself is not a game changer, but all of them together will attract tourists and give them other things to do.”

A large amount of money has to change hands before that can happen, though. The city has been struggling with accepting a price tag from the lowest bidder on the project of $1.6 million for a lighthouse it had expected would cost $780,000.

And unless the price tag comes down, officials may kick the lighthouse overboard.

“That’s what is supposed to go there, but will the world stop if we don’t put it there? No,” Brudnicki said. “If it comes to the point where the commission can’t see itself spending that much money, then we may have to do something else.”

Far cry from first lighthouses

The first lighthouse was likely a bonfire on a hillside to guide home a wayward voyager.

Panama City’s plans for its lighthouse are significantly different in design and function. The tower would house an elevator to the 65-foot-high observation deck on Lighthouse Point overlooking St. Andrew Bay and the redeveloped marina. A spiral staircase would wind back down from the observation deck under a transparent cable-rope mesh veil that would skirt out from the lighthouse to the ground, separating the space between each and creating a lighting effect below.

The lighthouse is engineered to withstand 140 mph winds with a light visible from 5 miles. The light would be seen from several adjacent cities and St. Andrews State Park, which drew 681,000 people in 2011.

Yet Panama City’s lighthouse is just one facet of the Marina Redevelopment Project, an overhaul of the design and use of the downtown marina. Some of the other plans include a band shell for outdoor performances, a splash pad for the children and a memorial walkway, a salute to the armed forces of Bay County.

Tying earlier lighthouse efforts to its 21st century counterpart is the Panama City Lighthouse Board, which has been petitioning the city since 2003. The group has pledged $263,000 to see the project to completion and already presented the city with a check for $50,000.

“There are people who are rabid about lighthouses,” said Pat Sabiston, president of the Lighthouse Board. “They love them and people feel like they are romantic.”

There are 30 different sized, shaped and geographically located lighthouses in Florida. Some can be accessed only by plane or boat, but either way, on average around 100,000 people annually visit each accessible lighthouse, according to Lighthouse Board documents.

At the upper end of the scale is Egmont Key lighthouse, with 204,393 visitors annually. St. Augustine’s lighthouse also draws more than 200,000 people per year. The Ponce de Leon lighthouse between St. Augustine and Cape Canaveral has a lighthouse, museum and gift shop. It averages 140,000 people each year at $5 for adults and $1.50 for children under 11. Not including gift shop profits, the adult admission fees generate about $700,000 in revenue each year, according to city documents.

Interactive map

Several of Florida’s lighthouses charge admission, from $3 to scale the lighthouse to $15 for boat tours. Panama City has discussed a $3 entrance fee and anticipates at least 50,000 visitors yearly and opportunities for branding and merchandise sales.

“It would be a wonderful attraction and will draw economic development,” Sabiston said.

Sabiston said after a recent forum on the marina project, many entrepreneurs approached officials with questions regarding business opportunities.

“When people see movement, they get excited and downtown has languished too long,” she said.

Click to visit the lighthouse group's website

Video proposal of lighthouse plans

The Florida Lighthouse Association (FLA) backs up Sabiston’s theory of the lighthouse being a beacon for economic development.

“There is an economic impact to tourism, and lighthouses are full-time tourist attractions,” said Ken Smith, president of FLA. “Lighthouses do one of three things: They attract boaters to something, warn boaters away from something or are used as a directional aid.”

Mariners could line up the light to know when they are in the channel to enter St. Andrew Bay or use its visibility to gauge their distance from land.

“In Panama City’s case it isn’t warning people, but it would show people the end of marina,” Smith added.

Besides the tourism aspect, marina manager Stan Jones said the lighthouse would put Panama City on the map.

Fully functional

Working in tandem with the Coast Guard, the Panama City Lighthouse would be a fully functional and approved nautical aid. As an official private aid to navigation, the lighthouse would end up on international shipping charts and be used as an aid to navigation.

“A pinpoint is valuable because you can look at where that is in relation to your heading and you can figure out where you are,” Jones said. “People don’t just use GPS. Any decent captain uses charts because electrical devices malfunction.”

With advances in navigation technology, much of the practical uses of lighthouses have been lost to mariners, leaving incremental tourist attractions along the more than 1,350 miles of Florida coastline.

“You don’t build it for the practical application,” Jones said. “You could put a light on the end of a pole and it would do the same thing, but there is a need for an aid to navigation.”

One criticism Jones said he has received of the lighthouse plans is it would not be antiquated enough to draw significant tourism revenue.

“People keep saying, ‘It’s not 80 or 100 years old,’ but it will be one day,” Jones said. “If you walk through any gift shop in Panama City, you’ll find ornaments or pictures of lighthouses.

“Who doesn’t love a lighthouse?” he added.

Lighthouse facts

To alert ships of the many hazards along the Florida coast, the federal government began erecting lighthouses in the 1820s. Each structure across the state has a distinctive color for daytime reckoning and a unique light sequence for nighttime identification.

Only three Florida lighthouses were built in the 20th century with the most recent being St. John’s River light at Mayport in 1954. Prior to that, the Hillsboro Inlet Lighthouse, one of the most powerful lighthouses at 370,000 candlepower, was built in 1906.

Panama City’s lighthouse would be the first 21st century lighthouse in the state.

To alert ships of the many hazards along the Florida coast, the federal government began erecting lighthouses in the 1820s. Each structure across the state has a distinctive color for daytime reckoning and a unique light sequence for nighttime identification.

Only three Florida lighthouses were built in the 20th century with the most recent being St. John’s River light at Mayport in 1954. Prior to that, the Hillsboro Inlet Lighthouse, one of the most powerful lighthouses at 370,000 candlepower, was built in 1906.

Panama City’s lighthouse would be the first 21st century lighthouse in the state.